My favorite Kirkland products are Kirkland ties, because when you get salad dressing or
just throw them away, don't be a snob.
I became a millionaire when I was 28 years old.
I'm thrilled that I became a millionaire, but not as thrilled as you think.
I graduated from Harvard Law School in 1984.
I go to the Goldman Sachs training program where you don't make any money.
And my second paycheck, I made $300,000.
And then the next one, I made 750,000.
And I couldn't believe it.
I happened to have a couple of good months, but I was so grateful.
I love Goldman. Goldman did that for me.
I remember going home.
My mom was an artist, my dad's salesman, and my mom was dying of cancer.
I thought she'd be so proud of me.
I said, Mom, I'm a millionaire.
I made all this money and she was in a stage of her life where she was, let's just say,
not subtle. Given the fact that the clock was ticking and she said, You, my son, are
embarrassing me and embarrassing yourself, is that what it is?
Was it always about the money?
I said, No, Mom, I'm just proud.
It's just why be proud if you wrote something great.
Be proud if you were an artist.
Don't be proud because you made money.
When I leave this earth.
If this is what it's about.
I was a failure.
When you really made some money, stop.
Go be a writer.
Well, I have written 3000 words a day for 20 years.
I'd like to think that what she'd be proud of was my writing.
My dad was proud that I made money in the market.
But money isn't everything.
And I'm saying that as someone who many people feel is a dollar sign represented by a man.
So I remember those hard times at that dinner table.
Let me tell you about some things I refuse to spend money on.
I don't really care if it's a hockey game or a baseball game.
I don't care where I get it.
I just go and watch.
We went out to a bunch of baseball games as a team and I bought bleacher seats.
They're fun. You know, it's fun to go to a game and not make it so it's like an arm and a leg.
But for football, I'll spend because I'm a huge Eagles fan.
When I go out to restaurant and I've owned restaurants, I will not spend money on
liquor. And that's because I was brought up in a frugal house where my dad didn't want me to order the coke until
the food came because he was afraid.
That charge of the second coke.
When I see a bottle of wine that's for $500, I said, What a waste.
Why didn't you just go buy a beautiful sweater?
Can you imagine the kind of sweater you could get for that?
A $500. You get two, two great cashmere sweaters.
Tobacco. I always say, look, there was a time when I recommend it because you got the dividend and you can do whatever you want with the dividend.
You can give it away to anti-smoking cause.
Now, I don't do anymore.
I want smoking stopped in the country.
I think that tobacco is wrong and it's killed a lot of people.
It killed my late father in law.
I watched it happen when my wife and I talk about, say, hotels.
I'll say, how long are we going to be in that hotel room?
Are we spending the day there? We went to Costa Rica and we stayed at the most expensive.
We stayed at four seasons.
We were out every single minute.
Next time we went, we stayed at an eco hotel.
It was 1/10, 1/10 the price of four seasons.
And we never went into it until the moment we were going to go to sleep. It had air conditioning.
So, I mean, you want to figure out your priorities. On a trip.
are you going to be in or out? If you're going to be in the whole time, maybe a nice bottle of wine, ask what you could
have bought with that. If you go to a supermarket and you buy the most expensive thing to have
and there's a generic that's the same.
Like if you go to a by the way, you go to Walgreens or you go to any of the Kroger stores, the Kroger brand is every
bit as good. How about Costco?
Get a membership? I only buy Kirkland.
I don't buy anybody else's. Kirkland.
is there generic?
but it's better than everybody's.
Are we partners or are we separate?
I said, We're partners, she said.
Then our decisions must be 5050.
I can't own individual stocks, so please don't think I'm two faced about what I'm about to tell you.
I have no individual stocks, I have index funds and I have some gold crypto.
So I'm married.
My wife and I sit down and we discuss our finances and when I turn 65,
she said to me, You know, I'm not that far behind you in age, but what I'm if I outlive you substantially,
what happens if I own a portfolio of stocks, S&P and S&P?
I don't know what what happens if the market goes bad after you die?
I thought we were partners.
I said we're partners.
But I spent more time telling people how to handle it more.
I can do what they're going to do. And I just I shows I got them just I don't care about any of that.
We're partners.
So I am making executive decision that 50% of this is yours, 50% is mine.
And the 50% that I have is going to be cash.
And I did it. The market went up.
But she just said when it went up, great, your half went up?
Terrific. We still benefit, but I can sleep at night and I couldn't before.
When I did it, I regretted it because I hope for great longevity.
We all hope for great longevity, but I'm happily married.
And she's 50%.
So we're 50%.
My biggest investing regret, and why, was that I owned a $2 stock.
And I just kept buying it and buying it and buying it thinking, you know what?
What's the worst that
happens?
The
$2 stock I bought was a company called Memorex Telex.
I was in touch with management.
I did all the work.
I looked at all the filings, and I bought a million down every quarter point a million
shares. I realized it was time to stop because it was going to zero, and I wanted to be able to get some sort of
capital out of it before it went to zero and it went to zero.
I ended up with 5 million shares and I took a loss at 3/8 and I just
wish that I could have that money back.
But it was the worst percentage loss I've ever had.
And what that tells you is the lesson is very clear.
Just because it's a two bucks, don't think you can't lose a lot of money.